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Old Posted Jan 26, 2009, 4:31 AM
pwp pwp is offline
Hello.
 
Join Date: Apr 2008
Location: Philly
Posts: 455
Summary

For the sake of saving time and not reinventing the wheel, Don's quoted below to summarize why an expansive subway system is a valuable, if not necessary, step for Philadelphia's growth. Philly has designed a system which transports thousands upon thousands of suburbanites into the city but has failed to provide a modern and efficient means of moving them within the city. Imagine the possibilities of an improved system with additional subway lines: A Parkway route, The Boulevard subway, City Ave Line, etc. Couple this expansion with the American Commerce Center, low real estate prices and a burgeoning population of college graduates. Maybe if we work together one day we can see this come to fruition.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Don098 View Post
Public transportation in Philadelphia is geared towards the suburbs with a subway that only runs along the absolute skeleton of the city with enormous gaps. Other American cities as dense as Philadelphia, like Chicago, New York, Washington DC, Boston, San Francisco, etc. all have more expansive subway and rail networks WITHIN the city so residents can move about the city as a pedestrian commuter rather than driving to each station. In Philadelphia, you can't really get around WITHIN the city via our subway network unless you live within the buffer zones of broad street and market street. If you look at a population density map, you can see that huge, huge chunks of the city do not live within reasonable walking distance of a subway to move around efficiently. Sure there are buses but they are certainly slower than cars which is why a better subway network could compete with cars in terms of travel time.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Don098 View Post
I think there is a chance that Obama may enact a bill for subway systems to stimulate inner-city rejuvenation that is similar in scale to Eisenhower's Federal-Aid Highway Act (National Interstate Highways and Defense Act) of 1956. He is definitely our first urban president in a LONG, LONG time and I highly anticipate some real transformative federal appropriation to help cities. That's the only way we're going to reintegrate our cities in this country. Not only would this act be an infrastructure improvement, but by declining car culture it would help to alleviate some our road congestion problems (much less need to spend billions in widening roads), less need for expensive underground city parking facilities, a greater sense of community, less health problems as people walk more, and a move away from sprawling suburbs which would help to mitigate climate change in terms of land use feedbacks as well as less GHGs. Electricity demands would be higher, but in conjunction with a move to clean energy, this is really how a true, intelligent investment of federal funds would help to get america running again. People need to understand that these bailouts, if done correctly, are INVESTMENTS. It's not like renting apartments or buying a car where your money just disappears or depreciates immediately. These are very long term investments that in the end would be a bed rock foundation to our nation's economy.
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